


Culture Clashes (and Maybe Some Classes)

by c0cunt



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Werewolves Are Known, Jewish Character, Jewish Jean Kirstein, M/M, Werewolf Eren Yeager
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-12
Updated: 2016-05-12
Packaged: 2018-06-08 00:20:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6831343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/c0cunt/pseuds/c0cunt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean is more than a little nervous to tell Maman that he's engaged to his boyfriend.  Hopefully, she'll keep her insults to a minimum when Jean tells her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Culture Clashes (and Maybe Some Classes)

  Eren looked completely relaxed after having finally gotten his shower out of the way.  And Jean wasn't exactly happy that he'd be the one to ruin that tranquility, but since his Maman had invited them over for dinner, better to interrupt him now than when they would be ten minutes late again.

  "Eren, ya mutt, c'mon, I know you feel like your bones are mush now, but we gotta go.  Maman's waiting for us," Jean said as he tossed a pair of Eren's boxers at his relaxed form.  Eren let out a whining noise that reminded Jean of a very sad puppy, and at any other time he would've just let Eren rest, but Maman already had a short fuse with him...So Jean threw Eren's clean pair of pants at him, the ones without the holes around the bottom of the pant legs, followed almost immediately by a white undershirt and one of the many plaid button ups that Jean knew he wouldn't mind having to worm his way into.  "Ten minutes, and if you aren't out by then I'm pelting you with those Kongs," Jean warned as he left their bedroom.

  He ended up pacing around their living room, and glancing at the clock on the wall every five seconds.  Eren left their bedroom with half a minute to spare, ignoring his boots and instead slipping his feet into a pair of sandals that hadn't been shoved away when their summer gear had been packed away.  They were a bit too big on Eren's feet, and unless they belonged to someone from the pack, they were probably Jean's, but he was too on edge to mind that Eren had absconded with his sandals.  Eren stumbled out the door, blearily blinking up at the sunset as he twisted the ring on his finger repeatedly.  Jean locked the door behind them as Eren stumbled into the truck, not even bothering with the passenger's door and instead just hopping into the bed of the truck with a groan.

  "Eren, that's still illegal," Jean sighed as he hopped onto the cab step and peered over the bed's sides.  Eren tiredly raised an arm to flip him off, but didn't move otherwise.  Jean stared at him for a few minutes, humming the Jeopardy theme, before giving up and throwing a plastic blue tarp over his lazy mutt boyfriend fiance.  "Before we get there, I wanna chat with you about human stuff," Jean warned as he shoved himself into the driver's seat, ignoring how Eren's head popped up at that.  He quickly got the truck moving, the zen calmness of driving allowing him to sort out his thoughts a bit.

  Eren had known practically nothing about human practices before he met Jean.  The Jaeger family was part of a traditionalist pack, where young males were kicked out of the pack by the time they reached maturity (which had been standardized among their pack as reaching their 15th birthday), and did not conform to any of human society's ways...Well, aside from the whole school thing, wolves definitely had their own school systems set up so that full moon weeks wouldn't interfere with anyone's studies.  Hell, Jean had had to explain to Eren the concept of dating five years ago.  Wolf marriages were a lot more fluid and less legally binding than human marriages.  Plus, the parents of the wolves who intended to marry were much less involved than human parents...Which was another of Jean's worries.

  Maman had always impressed upon Jean the need to marry within the Jewish community.  No need to explain why you celebrated holidays that weren't nationally recognized, most likely no need to explain why you didn't eat shellfish or pork (which, Jean was guilty of ignoring more than a few times).  (He couldn't resist shrimp, okay?  Pork on the other hand, was absolutely banned from their house.  Not even Eren's whimpering for the three months after switching completely to turkey bacon could bring that back.)  And while all that was fine and dandy...Eren wasn't Jewish.  Which, to Maman, was a second, almost as negative strike against Eren.  Jean still flinched thinking about how hatefully Maman had called Eren the "wet dog in the woods that followed you home" not even two years ago.  Prejudice was a hard thing to kill.

 

 As usual, the drive into Trost felt a lot shorter than it actually was.  With Maman's house just at the edge of suburbia, it was a bit further out than the apartments they had rented growing up, but he liked Maman's house much better.  It was a two story townhouse, with two bedrooms and a brick facade that Maman had always dreamed about, and Jean was more than happy to have gotten it for her after his first two years of playing for the Trost Titans.  It was the least he could do, after the years of just the two of them struggling in tiny apartments in the middle of the city.  When Jean finally shoved the truck into park in front of Maman's home, Eren banged a fist against the back window before he scrambled out of the truck with much more grace than Jean would've been able to manage.  He threw the door open and was about to step out, before Eren was crowding into the cab's space.

  "Something human you wanted to tell me, love?"  Eren asked, either entirely unaware of how Jean was suddenly way too hot as he was pressed back into the seat, or entirely aware and waiting to get a rise out of him.  The small smile that slowly grew filthy and predatory, before Eren pressed himself against Jean a bit harder, made Jean want to huff and shove Eren out of the truck.  But the last time he'd done that, Eren had whacked his head on the truck door and they'd had to go to his father's clinic and get him stitched up.  Maman wasn't going to take that as an excuse again, so Jean just let him be as he mentally snatched at the thoughts that had been swirling through his mind before parking.

  "Yeah...Yeah, the ring thing, gotta tell you more about that," Jean nodding as his words slowly started to head in the right direction.  Eren raised an eyebrow but remained silent, his eyes flicking to the white gold band that Jean had spent a lot of time trying to find the perfect design for.  "The ring's more...It's kind of supposed to be a promise?"  Jean rubbed the back of his neck as he tried to figure out how to properly explain.

  "A promise?"  Eren parroted, squatting down next to Jean's thigh instead of looming over him.

  "Yeah.  Human marriages aren't just 'hand a ring over and it's all done'.  There's marriage license applications, the ceremony itself, and a reception's optional but most people have those too.  Uhm...Usually that all can take a long time to plan, but the only thing that really has to be done is the license application and the ceremony..."  Jean trailed off, frowning slightly as he noticed the curtains in Maman's front window swishing.  Busted.  With a sigh, Jean nudged Eren to hop out of the truck, finally unbuckling himself and sliding out of the truck behind him.

  "Just...If Maman asks when this is all gonna go down, just shrug and say we haven't picked a date," Jean mumbled, knowing that even though Eren was already almost at the front door, he'd clearly been heard as if he'd said it into Eren's ear.  Another perk of being a full wolf that Jean could only imagine.  Eren nodded, waiting for Jean to jog over to him before ringing the doorbell, already flinching as the door flew open.

 

  Maman, despite being exactly five feet tall, was a very intimidating woman.  She had had Jean late in her life, and was approaching 65, if Jean remembered her birthday correctly, the lines on her face a harsh reminder that she had spent her life struggling.  The frown lines had grown harsher in the past few years, even though Jean knew she was happy that he was happy...The people at temple were vicious, though, and Maman couldn't shut her ears to their nastiness.  The wrinkles at the edges of her eyes turned up as she smiled happily at Jean, immediately pulling him into a welcoming hug.

  "My Jeanbo, it's been too long.  You spend all your time up in those woods nowadays..." Maman said mournfully as she let him go, smoothing her rough hands over his long sleeves.

  "Maman, I was here not even three days ago," Jean said with a strained laugh.  Eren seemed to be shrinking in on himself, not wanting to snap Maman's attention to him before she was already in a good mood.  She was smiling though, which was just about as good as it was going to get with her, Jean decided as he draped his left arm protectively over Eren's shoulders.  Eren tensed underneath him for the half a second that Maman's eyes drifted over to him, but relaxed the second that she turned and gestured for them to come inside.

  "Three days is too many days to be out in those woods.  You know there's a lot of mangy dogs running loose out there,"  Maman said fretfully.  The warning wouldn't have been so harsh if one of those 'dogs' that she was concerned about was literally standing in her living room, frantically biting on his tongue to keep himself from letting out a whimper or a growl.

  "Maman, enough," Jean said sharply.  Maman shrugged unconcerned that she'd once again upset her future son in law...Jean figured now was better than waiting until later for her to notice the ring.  "We're engaged," Jean said bluntly, and Eren let out a little confused huffing noise.  Belatedly, Jean realized he'd never actually said that word, but he was too busy warily watching Maman's reactions to do more than squeeze Eren's hand.

  She stood very still, as if the words wouldn't be true if she didn't move.  Slowly she turned to face the pair, her expression carefully blank as she sat down in her favorite armchair.  Jean wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing, exchanging an anxious glance with Eren, who seemed about two seconds away from bolting.  Slowly, Maman's head cocked to the left, and her eyes squinted as they flickered quickly between her son and...

  "Is he converting then?"  Maman eventually asked, her tone still reasonable.  Jean blinked widely for a second, before shrugging.  It hadn't even really crossed his mind to think about Eren converting.  Religion just wasn't a wolf thing, really, and there were very few rabbis who would sponsor a wolf.  Probably none of the rabbis at the synagogue that he and Maman attended would sponsor Eren even if he wanted to.  Jean's shrugging obviously didn't satisfy Maman, her expression turning thunderous.

  "I won't support it at all if he doesn't convert.  That's the least this dog can do," She snapped, glaring at Eren as if he had said he wasn't going to.  Eren let out the tiniest of whimpers as he curled in on himself to hide behind Jean, who was gritting his teeth angrily.

  "Maman, you can't be serious!  I love Eren, and he doesn't have to convert or anything for our marriage to be legal.  Just...If you don't support us, tell me now so we can get out of here and stop wasting your time."  The words were bitter as they left Jean's mouth, words that he couldn't take back, and their effect was immediate.  Maman recoiled as if she had been burned, mouth flying open in shock.  Eren, too, seemed shocked by Jean's words, but he was much better at hiding it.  But Jean had really had enough, had forced Eren to go through more shit than anyone should get from their partner's parents, and if Maman was more interested in Jean finding a nice Jewish woman (preferably, though she wasn't as upset about his bisexuality as he had been about him dating a werewolf) to settle down with instead of the man that Jean had chosen...He had waited long enough, hoping that Maman would see sense and at least accept that Eren was just as real and human as the people at temple...

  "Get out of my house."  Maman whispered faintly, her hands gripping the arms of her chair.  She took a deep breath through her nose, and repeated them again, a bit louder.  Jean stared at her blankly as Eren backed away from her, unsure if she would start shouting or crying.  "You may come back once you've seen sense, but until then..."  Maman's voice cracked as she shook her head, pushing herself out of the chair and heading to the kitchen, ignoring her son and his fiancee as if they had turned into furniture.

  Jean stared blankly at where his Maman had disappeared.  She couldn't have...After all these years...Jean's eyes burned as Eren gently tugged him outside, digging around in Jean's pocket to find his keys, and silently helping him into the passenger's seat.  Usually Eren drove like a bat out of hell, enjoying the burst of speed and freedom that he could only experience when in wolfskin, but tonight he drove at almost a normal speed.  Jean just...Couldn't wrap his head around Maman actually telling them to leave.  She was the only family Jean had, and had drilled into his head that family had to stick together no matter what...Apparently marrying a werewolf into the family was the straw that broke the camel's back. 

 

  "Hey..." Eren said, gently reaching for Jean's hands, and oh, when had they parked?  Jean blinked rapidly a few times, taking in that they were parked in front of their cabin, and that Eren was once again squeezing into the truck as best he could in front of Jean’s seat.  Jean fumbled for the seatbelt buckle, staring down at it in surprise when he realized that he'd never buckled in, allowing Eren's warm hands to coax him out of the truck.  Eren easily hauled him up, encouraging Jean to wrap his legs around his waist.  Eventually him got the memo and did so, Eren's hands scooping underneath his upper thighs as he carried Jean like a clinging koala up their front steps, Jean's arm quickly swatting out to knock the truck's door closed before he was too far away to do so. 

  Jean let Eren carry him to their room and lay him down, Eren slipping off his boots and slipping him out of his tight jeans.  It didn't matter to him, really, having mentally checked out as soon as he hit the bed, but appreciating Eren's attempt at making him comfortable.  Eren disappeared for a few minutes, returning with an even more concerned look at seeing Jean hadn't moved at all.  His sandals were gone, as was his flannel shirt, and Jean reached out for Eren with heavy arms and a heavy heart.  As soon as Eren was on the bed, Jean started to curl into a ball that Eren easily wrapped around, murmuring useless words of comfort.

 

* * *

  
  
  


  "So, what would I have to do to convert or whatever?"  Eren asked eventually, as the pair of them once again found themselves huddled in the kitchen, around the coffee machine.  Jean blinked slowly at him, before he shrugged widely.  It didn't matter, honestly:  Maman wouldn't support them even if Eren was born and raised Jewish.  He wasn't entirely human, and she couldn't live with that, so there was no reason to attempt to please her.  Jean had come to terms with that when he hadn't so much as received a phone call from her on his birthday, and even though it stung, he wouldn't attempt to reach out.  She was the one who had set fire to that bridge, and Jean wasn't going to be the one to throw water onto it.

  "Dunno, honestly...Pretty sure that since we're Reformed, you wouldn't have to get circumcised..."  Jean mumbled with a slight laugh.  He wasn't 100% sure about that, but it wasn't likely.  Eren stared at him blankly as if he'd grown a second head.

  "Circumcised?"  Eren repeated, his eyebrows crunching in obvious confusion, which just had Jean stare blankly back at him.

  "You...Don't know what circumcision is?"  Jean asked faintly.  Eren shook his head as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, uncomfortable that there was yet another thing about humans that he didn't know.  Jean closed his eyes and rubbed at his temples for a minute, silently begging god to give him the strength to deal with this, eventually deciding on going at it as clinically as possible.

  "You...Y'know how your dick has the foreskin and all?  Circumcision is the removal of that foreskin, usually a few hours after a boy's birth.  It's...How didn't you know that, why did I have to explain that to you?"  Jean whined slightly, his cheeks burning in embarrassment as he grabbed the milk out of the fridge.  Eren's eyes had widened almost impossibly, until they were nearly bugging out of his head, and the look of horror on his face was almost comical.

 "You...Humans allow guys with knives to whack around and remove skin from their newborn's dicks?"  Eren looked like he was going to puke, and just in case Jean hooked his ankle around the bucket that was under the counter in case Eren needed somewhere to aim his puke.  "What the fuck...I just thought that was how human dicks looked?"  Eren sounded almost desperate for that to not be true, which almost (almost) made Jean feel bad about revealing the truth to him.  Eren looked at his coffee (in that old, worn mug, that Jean was mildly determined to replace sometime in the next year), and let out a long, low sigh.

  "Starting off to be more of a whiskey morning than a coffee morning," Eren said, setting the mug aside before heading out the back door to find a nice place to sit while trying to wrap his head around why the fuck humans would ever do such a thing.


End file.
